Thane court to hear defamation case against Rahul Gandhi, Sitaram Yechury on 1 July for linking RSS with Gauri Lankesh's murder

Thane: The Thane session court will hear a civil defamation suit filed by RSS activist Vivek Champanerkar against the Congress president Rahul Gandhi and Communist Party of India (Marxist) leader Sitaram Yechury on 1 July. [caption id=“attachment_5530941” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File image of Congress president Rahul Gandhi. Twitter/@INCIndia[/caption] Vivek Champanerkar had moved the court through his advocate Aditya Mishra, following which court had on 1 April issued summons to Gandhi and Yechury for allegedly linking Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) with the murder of journalist Gauri Lankesh and had directed them to be present before the court on 30 April. Gauri Lankesh, a senior journalist was murdered in her residence in Bengaluru on 5 September, 2017. Mumbai Metropolitan Magistrate court is also hearing a similar defamation case filed by Dhrutiman Joshi on 22 February over the same issue. Joshi in his complaint had said that Gandhi had made statements that “anybody who speaks against the ideology of the BJP, against the ideology of the RSS is pressured, beaten, attacked and even killed." The complainant stated in his complaint that Sitaram Yechury was heard and seen saying that it was the RSS ideology and the RSS men who killed Gauri Lankesh. Joshi had stated that for a mere political score, the accused have unnecessarily dragged in the name of RSS and defamed the RSS in a definite move to rake up negative sentiments in the minds of the people against the RSS. He had also requested the court to investigate the accused under the provisions of CrPc for offences punishable under Section 499 and 500 of the IPC.